Notes
- Peter Probst, The Art of Heritage in a Yoruba City (Forthcoming). Work has been completed and I am currently preparing the manuscript for publication.
- The following biographical account is based on Rolf Brockmann and Gerd Hötter, Adunni: A Portrait of Susanne Wenge (Hamburg: Machart, 1994); Günther Eisenhut, “Susanne Wenger,” in Moderne in Dunkler Zeit, ed. G. Eisenhut and P. Weibel. (Graz: Verlag Groschl, 2001); and my own conversations with Susanne Wenger in Osogbo between 2001 and 2008.
- For a biography of Beier, see Wole Odundele, Omoluabi: Ulli Beier, Yoruba Society and Culture (Bayreuth: Bayreuth African Studies Series, 2003).
- For a description of the project see Ulli Beier, The Return of the Gods: The Sacred Art of Susanne Wenger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975); as well as Susanne Wenger, The Sacred Groves of Osogbo (Wien: Kontrapunkt, 1990).
- Susanne Wenger, The Timeless Mind of the Sacred (Ibadan: Institute of African Studies, 1977), 8, 11.
- Ibid., 54.
- Ibid., 7.
- On SI see Simon Ford, The Situationist International (London: Black Dog, 2005).
- The mediator between Vienna and Paris and translator of Breton's writings was the German artist and poet Edgar Jené. See Edgar Jené and Max Hölzer, Surrealistische Publikationen (Klagenfurt: J. Haid, 1950).
- Guy Debord, “The Theory of the Dérive,” in The Theory of the Dérive and other Situationist Writings on the City, ed. L. Andreotti and X. Costa (Barcelona: Actar, 1996), 22–7. Dérive prefigured much of what French scholars such as De Certeau later popularized as “spatial tactics.” See Michel De Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984).
- Gerd Chesi, Susanne Wenger: A Life with the Gods (Wörgl: Perlinger, 1983), 135.
- For a good discussion of the various artistic groups within the life reform movement, see Renate Foitzek Kirchgraber, Lebensreform und Künstlergruppen um 1900, unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Department of Art History (University of Basel, 2003).
- Rudolf Steiner, Nature Spirits: Selected Lectures (London: Rudolf Steiner Press, 1995). I am indebted to Beat Wyss (University of Zürich) for making me aware of the linkage between Steiner and Wenger.
- The argument is difficult to prove though. Wenger was a member in the youth organization Wandervögel. She also knew about Steiner's teachings. In my own conversations with her she showed sympathy for anthroposophic ideas but rejected any direct influence.
- See Steiner, 1995.
- Ulli Beier, “Susanne Wenger: An Example of Afro-European Culture Contact”. Black Orpheus, No. 2 (1962).
- Babatunde Lawal, “The Search for Identity in Contemporary Nigerian Art”. Studio International, March-April (1977), 145–150.
- Bola Olowo, “Living with the Gods: A Profile of an Artistic Enigma”. West Africa, No. 3745, 29. May–4. June (1989), 874–5.
- See Lawal, 1977.
- Susanne Wenger, letter to the editor of Sunday Sketch in reply to the article “The Oshogbo Incident”, January 10th 1985.
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Quoted after the respective document from the Osogbo Local Government. Sent as a copy to Ulli Beier. I am grateful to Ulli Beier for letting me read and quote from the document.
- In an open letter from May that year to her friends and supporters Wenger herself commented on the distinction as follows: “I knew well enough already then which message that award is meant to forward to me, namely the military Government is decided to get rid of me. I expressed my sympathy as a fellow-captive to the sow who is expected to be honored to be chosen for slaughter”. Susanne Wenger: A Report. May, 14th, 1988.
- http://www.geocities.com/adunni1/aot.html, last visited May 8, 2007.
- Alois Riegl, Der Moderne Denkmalkultus: Sein Wesen und seine Entstehung (Wien & Leipzig: W Braunmüller. 1903).
- Guy Debord, La Société du Spectacle (Paris: Éditions Champ Libre, 1967).